Victory for nurse who lost leg in holiday crash

A nurse has won a landmark case against Thomas Cook three years after the travel company turned down her insurance claim for an amputated leg.

Sharon Healy, 40, was seriously injured in a coach crash in Turkey during a day trip booked with a Thomas Cook representative.

But when she claimed for her injury she was turned down on the grounds that she had not booked the excursion before she arrived in her resort.

Mrs Healy, of Ormskirk, Lancs, has now won a ruling that will force Thomas Cook to support her claim for compensation in the Turkish courts.

She lost her right leg from the knee down on the last day of her family's holiday in the resort of Side.

Having paid more than £1,000 for the holiday, and taken up the option of comprehensive insurance, she thought that making her claim would be a formality.

Instead, she was told that under the 1992 Package Holiday Regulations the insurance was invalid because she had paid for her excursion in the resort and not in Britain prior to departure.

The UK Insurance Services Ombudsman has now found in her favour and ordered Thomas Cook to help her secure compensation.

Yesterday Mrs Healy, who has had to give up her career in nursing, welcomed the move but expressed disgust at the way she had been treated.

She said: "It was an horrific accident and my life was turned upside down.

"After the coach crash my leg was hanging off. The doctors in Turkey did their best to save it but when I got back to the UK, I was told it was beyond repair.

"Through all the trauma I clung to the belief that at least I was fully insured with a reputable company like Thomas Cook.

"A Thomas Cook rep had sold me a coach and boat trip excursion, and I automatically assumed that the company's insurance would cover me for the loss of a limb and pay out enough compensation to help me cope with losing my job.

"But once I had recovered and asked Thomas Cook about it they insisted I was not eligible for anything. I was shocked and disgusted that they were using a get-out clause.

"There was no warning that I needed extra insurance when I booked the trip. Only afterwards did they try to say that because I booked it in the resort I was not covered."

Mrs Healy, who now works as a ward clerk, said: "Everything has become more difficult and I am having to do it with less money than I have had in the past.

"I wasn't asking for a lot but I just wanted compensating for what everyone else seems to agree was a very big loss."

The ombudsman ruled that the wording of the Thomas Cook policy was ambiguous.

Mrs Healy is now suing the Turkish coach company for £100,000. "I am relieved that the ombudsman has ruled in my favour and there is some hope that I will get justice.

"But the whole experience has been traumatic. I would like to see the Government changing the regulations to force tour companies to extend their insurance to excursions they sell in the resorts. I do not want anyone to go through what I have gone through."

A spokesman for the ombudsman said it was the responsibility of tour companies to make ambiguous clauses clear to holidaymakers before they travelled.